NIKITA MAZEPIN is on a collision course with his new Formula One bosses after his disgraceful video on social media.
The Russian is set to join the Haas team next season where he will partner Mick Schumacher.
But he got his career off to a bad start when he posted a video of him inappropriately groping a woman’s chest.
The Haas F1 team condemned the 21-year-old’s ‘abhorrent’ behaviour.
Mazepin will now be spoken to by team boss Gunther Steiner, who says he will be taking the incident ‘very seriously’.
Steiner said: “We take it very seriously, as you saw with what we sent out. I just want to reinforce that, that we will deal with it.
“I’m not going into detail on what we’ll do and how we’ll do it, but we take it seriously, and we will work to sort this out, what happened. Nothing more to say.”
Mazepin is no stranger to controversy both on and off the track.
During his final F2 race in Bahrain last weekend he picked up two penalty points to take his tally to 11 – one short of a one-race ban.
And in 2016, he was banned from a European Formula 3 race for punching Brit Callum Ilott.
Steiner says he will be speaking to Mazepin, the son of a chemicals billionaire, about his attitude.
He added: “That is part of it, what we’re going to speak to him about privately.
“I don’t want to go public on how we are doing this. I just go back, I don’t want to comment any more.
“I guess I ask people to respect that privacy, because we treat it seriously. But we will deal with it.”
Meanwhile, F1 and the FIA issued a joint statement – albeit a day too late – to support Haas and condemn Mazepin’s behaviour.
It said: “The ethical principles and diverse and inclusive culture of our sport are of the utmost importance to the FIA and Formula One.”
Having deleted the post, Mazepin has since taken to social media to apologise for his actions, insisting must ‘hold himself to a higher standard’.
He wrote: “I would like to apologise for my recent actions both in terms of my own inappropriate behaviour and the fact that it was posted onto social media.
“I am sorry for the offense I have rightly caused and to the embarrassment I have brought to Haas F1 Team.
“I have to hold myself to a higher standard as a Formula 1 driver and I acknowledge I have let myself and many people down.
“I promise I will learn from this.”
A woman who claims to have been in the video, however, has insisted the incident was an ‘internal joke’ between ‘friends’.
She wrote: “Hi guys, I just want to let you know Nikita and I have been good friends for a long time and nothing from the video was serious at all!
“We trust each other so much and this was a silly way of joking between us.
“I posted the video on his story as an internal joke. I am truly sorry.
“I can give you my word he’s a really good person and he would never do anything to hurt or humiliate me.”
